Page 32 of The Viscount and the Vixen
“And now Locke is married. I didn’t do bad by them, so how could I have wasted my life?”
“I don’t think you did,” she said with conviction.
“You’re a sweet thing. Locke will come around to loving you.”
Her chest tightened. “I don’t require his love, my lord.”
“We all require love, my dear. The more we think we don’t need it, the more we do.”
Again, another topic she wanted to leave behind. “Would you like for me to read to you?”
He shook his head. “Go do whatever it was you wanted to do with the keys.”
“I wish to explore the residence a bit, but I won’t disturb anything.”
He nodded, a faraway look coming into his eyes, and she suspected that she’d lost him, that he was out on the moors with his love. Standing, she leaned over and pressed a kiss to the top of his head. He barely acknowledged her.
Clutching the keys, she walked from the room, wondering where to start. With the bedchambers. She could find one to secretly make into her own, except that Locksley was correct. When would she use it? Every hour of the night would be spent in his bed.
Surely there was another room that would serve better. A small library, a sitting room, a parlor, a little haven hidden away where she could escape to find peace. She wouldn’t have to tell anyone about it. It would be her private sanctuary. And as the marquess appeared to not wander about, her actions weren’t likely to upset him, as he probably wouldn’t stumble across whatever room she decided to clean.
And cleaning it would be the first order of business. She’d seen evidence of the neglect when Locksley had shown her the ballroom, and it was repeated in every room into which she stepped. Cobwebs, dust, decayed flowers. The suffocating odor of disuse. She needed a room with an abundance of windows so she could air it out quickly.
But as she wandered from various parlors and sitting rooms to drawing rooms and conservatories, melancholy began to take hold, to blot out any optimism. She could envision a time when all these rooms were well maintained, warm, and welcoming. They would have brought pride to the marquess and marchioness.
An even greater sadness washed through her as she realized that Locksley would have known none of what had once been. He grew up with the abandonment and dilapidation. Locks on doors couldn’t contain it. Knowing what rested on the other side of the doors, she could now feel it seeping into the hallways. It might have been better for all had the structure burned to the ground after the marchioness’s passing.
Then she opened a door that made her grateful the residence still stood. Light filtered in through a narrow parting between the draperies, but it was enough for her to see that she had stepped into a magnificent music room. Windows lined one wall. Near them rested the largest pianoforte she’d ever seen. So grand. Or it would be if the dark wood was polished to a sheen.
She approached with the reverence it deserved.
It had been years since she’d set fingers to keyboard, not since she’d left home. She’d offered to play for Montie, but he’d explained that when it came to her he was only interested in the music of passion that was created between the sheets. She’d been flattered, swept away by the notion that he wanted her so badly. It was a while before she understood that being wanted for only one purpose created a very lonely existence.
The type she would have with Locksley. At least he was honest with her, being forthright that he wanted from her only what Montie had wanted, but Montie had wooed her with pretty words and promises of love. Even if Locksley offered them, she was too wise now to believe them. She would not open her heart to him, merely her thighs.
As she neared the piano, she wanted to weep because it had gone years without being played, without anyone listening to the glorious music with which it would fill the air. Unappreciated, unloved, its potential unrealized. Tapping a key, cringing as a tinny sound reverberated, she wasn’t surprised it was in need of tuning, but that could be handled easily enough.
Slowly she began to turn in a circle, stopping when she noticed the life-size portrait of a woman hanging over the massive stone fireplace. She wasn’t particularly fetching, but there was warmth in her eyes, her smile. Portia had never known anyone to grin during a sitting, yet she couldn’t imagine this woman without a happy expression. Finding herself drawn to the painting, she took a couple of steps nearer. Based on the style of her royal blue gown, she had to be a recent marchioness, no doubt Marsden’s dead wife. She was covered in dust and cobwebs, and yet there was an ethereal quality to her that seemed to glow when her surroundings should have dulled the painting.
“How fortunate you were to be so loved,” she whispered.
Holding out her arms, Portia completed her circle, her joy burgeoning as she took in the various sitting areas, the shelves displaying books, statuettes, and vases, and the various decorations arranged throughout waiting to be released from their shroud of dust.
Clapping her hands together, she released the smallest of squeals. She had found her room.
It was late afternoon by the time Locke, covered in sweat and grime, strode into the kitchen. He didn’t know why he believed that if he worked in the mines alongside the miners that fortune was more likely to smile on them and they’d discover a tin-rich vein after two years of nothing. It had made the men uncomfortable when he’d begun digging beside them. He was a lord. It had taken them a while to accept his help, his determination. But he enjoyed stretching his muscles, pushing himself to the limit of near physical exhaustion. It kept his mind from traveling the path of despair. Today it had kept him from breaking his promise to his wife that the day belonged to her.
He shouldn’t have kissed her before he walked out, because her taste had stayed with him far too long, had kept his body tense and in need until he’d gone down into the pits where there was always a danger that he wouldn’t come out.
So perhaps his father had the right of it. He really did need to get the next heir lined up. Robbie would no doubt let the mines go, sell the land, since it wasn’t part of the entailment. He wouldn’t appreciate his heritage or what the marquesses who had come before him had built.
“You’re a bit early,” Mrs.Dorset told him, a knowing smile on her face. “Although to be honest, I was expecting you sooner, what with a new bride and all. Been warming your bathwater for some time now.”
He was in the habit of bathing after a day in the mines, which was the reason he’d established a room for bathing near the kitchen. For the convenience of procuring hot water and not tracking dirt through the residence. While he wasn’t particularly pleased with how anxious he was to be with his wife, he had no wish for her to see him in this state, to know he engaged in backbreaking work to secure their future—or how much that seventy-five quid a month was really costing him. They were not truly a couple who shared joys and burdens. They were merely bedmates. Or they would be by night’s end.
Still, when he was finished with his bath and shave, he did find himself missing her fingers knotting his neck cloth as he put on the clothes he’d changed out of that morning before leaving. For the mines he needed sturdier material.
When he stepped out of the bathing room, he nearly tripped over Mrs.Barnaby, who it seemed had been awaiting his appearance.
